Encouraging news on American views on Global Warming

A reprot titled “Climate change in the American Mind: Americans’ Global Warming Belief and Attitudes in September 2012 [PDF] was released by a Yale cooperative.

This report is based on findings from a nationally representative survey – Climate Change in the American Mind – conducted by the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication and the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication.

Americans’ belief in the reality of global warming has increased by 13 percentage points over the past two and a half years, from 57 percent in January 2010 to 70 percent in September 2012.

At the same time, the number of Americans who say global warming is not happening has declined nearly by half, from 20 percent in January 2010 to 12 percent today.

Also interesting is the finding that those who accept GW are more confident. The confidence of those who don’t is declining. You would not know that by the exchanges one might have online. AGW (Anthropogenic global warming) deniers are vehement in their stand against the science behind GW.

Today over half of Americans (58%) say they are “somewhat” or “very worried” – now at its highest level since November 2008.

Four in ten say people around the world are being harmed right now by climate change.

While that is hard to say for sure, it certainly is possible that we are already feeling the negative effects.

This entire report is easily readable but is full of statistics. However, it does paint a picture that people are accepting what multiple lines of evidence tell us – that climate change is happening and we should be concerned and thoughtful about it.

The National Center for Science Education says about the report: “Encouraging news about the level of public acceptance of climate change in the United States is at hand.”